This day will go down in my memory book as one of the greatest days I've ever had on the water for numbers of fish caught.
Worked all night and got off this morning; dad wanted to know if I wanted to go fish. Sure why not. So off to the Chick we go....got off to a late start waiting for it to warm up a bit. Got on the water at around 10:30 or so. Was gonna stay a few hours and head back home since I hadn't slept any. The fish wouldn't cooperate with those plans though.
Water temps in the upper 40s. 48 and 49 mostly where we were. Water was stained. Not clear. Not muddy.
I started the day off with a crappie on my first few casts...a short one. I could see a stump in shallow water and cast to it...but the fish hit away off from it. We kept throwing to shallow cover...and would occasionally get bit but finally figured out it was just lil bluegill. Up a few hundred yards away from us, were two boats sitting on this one spot. We could see them catching fish after fish for about an hour. We decided to leave since we weren't faring as well...made a move to another spot. I picked up a rod I had a crankbait tied on, since I could see some shallow stumps and such. I wanted to see if I could catch me an ole mossyback. Throw out there...boom...fish about takes the rod from me. Was a BIG white bass. Into the livewell it goes. Then for about 15 casts in a row, I caught one of them. Dad got in on the action with the Bobby Gs he was using but those fish wanted that crankbait. Then it just quit. And when they quit....dad started putting the thumpin' on me with crappie. I think he had 8 keepers in the livewell before I put my first keeper crappie in there. We sat there for a little while longer and the fish just stopped.
Decided we would head back to where we started...and try to do a side scan of the place the two boats were sitting earlier in the day. We got there and those two boats were gone...but another was there. Turned out, we knew them and they said to come right on in. And here is where the fun began. We had about 3 hours before dark. In those 3 hours, I caught more fish today than I have caught all year long combined. No lie. It was mostly all white bass, with a few yellows thrown in. They weren't breaking on top...but it sure was fun. Dad kicked it off here....he had caught about 20 to my 0. He caught one on every cast for about 20 minutes straight. Another boat came in and spooked the fish for a few minutes...then it was on again. I finally put on what he was using...which was a Charlie Brewer's slider grub. And we sat there in that one spot for the next 3 hours...catching fish as fast as we could throw out, catch one, take it off the hook, and throw back out. There was some wood cover down there...we got hung up a few times. But more often than not, we were reeling in fish. No doubt, it was what the other two boats were catching when we first got there. We caught a few more crappie there as well.
Ended up with 20 keeper crappie, and about 6 throw backs that were short. Biggest two were just 13 inches. The rest were 10.5 to 11 inch.
2 largemouth bass...nothing big. Not even 12 inches.
several bluegill
And AT LEAST 200 white bass A PIECE. I kept a few of the bigger ones for the deep fryer...these were decent size whites too. Biggest ones were 14-16 inches long and were a blast to catch. I had been up over 24 hrs without sleep and was wide awake as could be. Mine and dad's hands are both cut all to pieces from gill plates and dorsal fin spikes.
I've never had a day like this where we caught so many fish. Usually we are hearing of other people that caught 'em like that. But never us. Was glad to finally be there on a day they were biting. Musta been that black fog in the pics
Worked all night and got off this morning; dad wanted to know if I wanted to go fish. Sure why not. So off to the Chick we go....got off to a late start waiting for it to warm up a bit. Got on the water at around 10:30 or so. Was gonna stay a few hours and head back home since I hadn't slept any. The fish wouldn't cooperate with those plans though.
Water temps in the upper 40s. 48 and 49 mostly where we were. Water was stained. Not clear. Not muddy.
I started the day off with a crappie on my first few casts...a short one. I could see a stump in shallow water and cast to it...but the fish hit away off from it. We kept throwing to shallow cover...and would occasionally get bit but finally figured out it was just lil bluegill. Up a few hundred yards away from us, were two boats sitting on this one spot. We could see them catching fish after fish for about an hour. We decided to leave since we weren't faring as well...made a move to another spot. I picked up a rod I had a crankbait tied on, since I could see some shallow stumps and such. I wanted to see if I could catch me an ole mossyback. Throw out there...boom...fish about takes the rod from me. Was a BIG white bass. Into the livewell it goes. Then for about 15 casts in a row, I caught one of them. Dad got in on the action with the Bobby Gs he was using but those fish wanted that crankbait. Then it just quit. And when they quit....dad started putting the thumpin' on me with crappie. I think he had 8 keepers in the livewell before I put my first keeper crappie in there. We sat there for a little while longer and the fish just stopped.
Decided we would head back to where we started...and try to do a side scan of the place the two boats were sitting earlier in the day. We got there and those two boats were gone...but another was there. Turned out, we knew them and they said to come right on in. And here is where the fun began. We had about 3 hours before dark. In those 3 hours, I caught more fish today than I have caught all year long combined. No lie. It was mostly all white bass, with a few yellows thrown in. They weren't breaking on top...but it sure was fun. Dad kicked it off here....he had caught about 20 to my 0. He caught one on every cast for about 20 minutes straight. Another boat came in and spooked the fish for a few minutes...then it was on again. I finally put on what he was using...which was a Charlie Brewer's slider grub. And we sat there in that one spot for the next 3 hours...catching fish as fast as we could throw out, catch one, take it off the hook, and throw back out. There was some wood cover down there...we got hung up a few times. But more often than not, we were reeling in fish. No doubt, it was what the other two boats were catching when we first got there. We caught a few more crappie there as well.
Ended up with 20 keeper crappie, and about 6 throw backs that were short. Biggest two were just 13 inches. The rest were 10.5 to 11 inch.
2 largemouth bass...nothing big. Not even 12 inches.
several bluegill
And AT LEAST 200 white bass A PIECE. I kept a few of the bigger ones for the deep fryer...these were decent size whites too. Biggest ones were 14-16 inches long and were a blast to catch. I had been up over 24 hrs without sleep and was wide awake as could be. Mine and dad's hands are both cut all to pieces from gill plates and dorsal fin spikes.
I've never had a day like this where we caught so many fish. Usually we are hearing of other people that caught 'em like that. But never us. Was glad to finally be there on a day they were biting. Musta been that black fog in the pics
